Making healthy shifts—especially when it comes to sweet treats that give you pleasure—is key to making healthy eating deliciously sustainable. I know it was for me… Take these delicious Paleo vanilla cupcakes with chocolate frosting, for example. (By the way, this classic “yellow cake-chocolate frosting” combo has been a winner with everyone who has sampled […]
No-Guilt Flourless Chocolate Cake
Nothing says “love” like a flourless chocolate cake. Especially when it’s homemade. You don’t have to be gluten-free or wheat-free to appreciate the sheer decadence of a flourless chocolate cake. It’s a delectable way to enjoy a combination of healthy fats: pasture-raised eggs, grass-fed butter, dark chocolate and cocoa powder (ideally, unsweetened and 100% cocoa)—all […]
Show Me the Love! Ultra-Dark Chocolate Sweet Potato Brownies
Want to show your love? Give me chocolate—the darker, the better (I like 85% cocoa content or higher). Or…you could make these brownies! Why does chocolate = love? We have to credit the Mayans for creating this symbolic connection. In the 7th century, the Mayans migrated from Guatemala to the Yucatan peninsula, where they established […]
Oven-roasted Kabocha Squash “Fries”
I could prattle on about the many virtues of Kabocha squash, also known as Japanese pumpkin. In addition to sharing my kabocha squash fries recipe (see below), I’ll give you the cliff notes version on why kabocha is my favorite winter squash… Its flesh, which has a deep orange color and a dense, creamy and […]
Baked Ginger Pumpkin Custard
I love pie. A few years ago, I even won a red ribbon at a local, upstate apple pie baking contest for both my filling and my pie crust. That was then. Since being diagnosed with low thyroid in 2013, I have followed a strict wheat-free, gluten-free Paleo diet. This has been a good thing […]
Strawberry Love
This Valentine’s Day…show your beloved some strawberry love. Red and heart-shaped, the strawberry could be considered the perfect fruit for Valentine’s Day because it actually does help protect the heart. (And a healthy cardiovascular system is key for sexual arousal and responsiveness.) Anthocyanin, a phenol in strawberries, is what gives strawberries their distinct red color; […]
Having My Coconut Flour Coffee Cake (and Eating It Too)
Growing up, one of my favorite childhood treats was my mother’s sour cream coffee cake: the perfect marriage of a rich, moist yellow cake with the irresistible sugary crunch of its walnut-raisin topping. I inherited my mother’s much-coveted recipe. And, I confess, it’s the one home-baked treat that I’ve occasionally missed since I began following […]
Paleo Serrano-Pumpkin Muffins
In late fall, on days when the sky stretches grey and moody as far as the eye can see, and a bone-cold chill hints at snow to come, I often wake up on weekends at our old upstate New York farmhouse craving….muffins. And what I want are Paleo Serrano-Chili muffins. In terms of diet, I […]
The Call of the Cupcake
After 30 days of following a restrictive, no-sugar diet (for reasons that I’ll share in another post), I ventured to reintroduce a little forbidden sweetness into my life. Call it a “test”! Over the long weekend, I made my version of these Paleo vanilla cupcakes with a Fleur de Sel chocolate frosting for breakfast.
Birthday Cake for Breakfast…No Regrets
“I’m going to make myself a coconut cake,” I announced to my husband a week before my birthday. It would be a layer cake, with frosting and all. “Really?” he asked, shocked. I didn’t blame him. In all the years we’ve been together, neither of us have had an affinity for coconut—or any dish flavored […]